


Be Mine!

by subnivean



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, F/M, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Laura is Stiles's Babysitter, M/M, Minor Derek Hale/Paige, Minor Kate Argent/Derek Hale, Peter hale - Freeform, Valentine's Day, some Derek/Other and Stiles/Other before they get together, tags and rating will update with the fic
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-15
Updated: 2021-02-28
Packaged: 2021-03-16 14:27:44
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,854
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29455269
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/subnivean/pseuds/subnivean
Summary: When Stiles is seven, he gives Derek his heart. He never does get it back.A(n eventual) love story.
Relationships: Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski
Comments: 48
Kudos: 132





	1. Chapter 1

  
"Hey, hey," Stiles Stilinski said just before he poked his tiny finger to the right of Derek's closed eye. Derek winced and batted Stiles' hand away.  
  
" _Laura_ ," Derek said, inflecting his voice just enough to get his sister's attention wherever she was in the house. "Your pest is bugging me." Derek was sprawled on the sofa, exhausted in the way that post-basketball practice and running all the way home left him.  
  
"Pest!" Stiles said, indignant. Derek cracked open an eyelid and stared at him sidelong. Stiles was seven years old to Derek's fourteen, and the kind of manic energetic that only the combination of healthy child + ADHD + ability to zero in on a source of sugar at any time and any place could achieve. In other words, he was the kid whose last five babysitters had run screaming from him until Laura had begun advertising herself as a local baby werewolf sitter. Stiles was human, but his parents were fevered-eyed as they insisted that no, really, they'd sign the waivers, they totally trusted Laura with their child and in fact probably only a werewolf could keep up with him. "Laura had to go into town to get Cora," Stiles said. "She said I'm your problem now. I'm hungry."  
  
Derek stared at him blankly, and Stiles blinked his huge gold eyes in what a fool would mistake as an innocent gesture. Stiles was hellspawn (no insult to his mother intended, though Claudia Stilinski was widely regarded to be herself no angel), frequently the ringleader to whatever disaster befell the household, trailed after by the three _actual_ werewolf kids Laura also babysat on the regular. Isaac Lahey and Vernon Boyd weren't in as frequent need of babysitting as Stiles, though, given they each had older siblings or retired grandparents to step in. Stiles had two working parents and no extended family to pick up the slack. Cora was the other baby werewolf, but she was enrolled in roughly a dozen after school programs and weekend classes, and even though they were family and lived in the same house, Derek hardly ever saw his little sister.  
  
He _did_ see a lot of Stiles, enough to know that Stiles wouldn't stop once started, and so it was with a heaving sigh he sat up and got off the couch, wincing at the feel of mending muscles in his legs. Werewolf healing factor was awesome, but sometimes he pushed too hard for it to keep up. Stiles let out a brief cheer and bounced at Derek's side as they headed into the kitchen.  
  
"Curly fries!" Stiles chanted. "Derek, curly fries. Curly fries! Cuuuuurly. Fries!"  
  
Derek shook his head. "No way, Short Stack." There was a brick of cheddar in the fridge, some apples, and home-baked bread from yesterday. Derek hesitated once he had his ingredients assembled. Snack platter or grilled cheese?  
  
He glanced down at Stiles, who was nearly dancing on socked feet. He was the kind of kid who got excited over food, eyes shining and delighted. He wasn't really picky, and it wasn't like grilled cheese was a heck of a lot healthier than curly fries – or healthier at all, in fact – but what the hell.  
  


* * *

  
  
When not stepping in to cover Laura's babysitter responsibilities, Derek could commonly be expected to be in the vicinity of one Paige Katsaros. Usually this meant her, studiously working through lunch hour at a picnic table to get ahead on one class or another, and him, creeper-ly staring from afar.  
  
"Pathetic," Peter tsked.  
  
Derek tore his gaze away from Paige long enough to glare. "We've had this talk," he said, frankly.  
  
"The talk about how you're pathetic?"  
  
"The talk about how creepy it is that you routinely sneak into the high school, _Uncle_ Peter."  
  
Peter smirked and stole the apple out of Derek's lunch bag. Derek's mom had packed him that apple. Derek's glare intensified, and Peter's smirk matched it. "I don't see anyone kicking me off campus."  
  
"They would be if they knew you were a twenty-nine year old drama major dropout."  
  
"And yet, I don't look a day over seventeen."  
  
Derek rolled his eyes. Werewolves aged slowly. With conscious effort, they could age _very_ slowly. Keeping himself looking young was about the most work Uncle Peter ever put into anything.  
  
Peter nodded in Paige's direction and, adopting an actual serious tone, said, "You know she knows you watch her, correct?"  
  
"Yes," Derek said through gritted teeth. It was hard to hide things from supernaturals – the ones that paid attention to all their senses, anyway. Paige held herself differently when she knew she was being watched than when she thought she was alone. And yes, Derek realized it was creepy that he knew that.  
  
"And she doesn't seem too opposed to you watching her."  
  
Derek narrowed his eyes and waited for his uncle to get to the point.  
  
"So why don't you grow a backbone and actually ask her out? All signs point to her saying yes."  
  
Across the courtyard, Paige was frowning intently at her open book, writing without looking into her open notebook as her other hand twirled a long curl around three fingers. Derek's heart gave a traitorous stutter.  
  
"I don't want to distract her," Derek admitted. "I heard her talking about all the work she has to put in to qualify for this scholarship she wants. She has a really good chance of getting it."  
  
"Derek." Peter's voice, uncharacteristically serious, drew Derek's attention. Peter stared at him with patient intent. "She'll say yes."  
  
Derek scowled. "I just said –"  
  
"If you ask her out," Peter enunciated slowly, "Say, for next Tuesday after school, she'll say yes."  
  
"I _know_ she'll –"  
  
"She will," Peter said again.  
  
His assuredness punctured Derek, who felt his face crumple. "But what if she doesn't?"  
  
"She will." Peter stood and patted Derek's shoulder. "If you get over there and ask her right now, she definitely will."  
  
And she did, though she seemed a little nonplused and surprised at going out on a Tuesday. But she probably had to do all sorts of extracurricular things over the weekend and Derek didn't want to get in the way of her schedule, and besides, no one ever did anything on Tuesdays. Tuesdays were boring days. Right? Next Tuesday, which was the fourteenth, of February, which made it -  
  
Derek was halfway home when he realized he'd asked his crush out to go on a first date on Valentine's Day.  
  
Fucking Peter.  
  


* * *

  
  
It was a disaster.  
  
They were on either side of a diner booth, fidgeting and staring at each other, because of course all the actual restaurants in town were booked up, given it was _Valentine's Day._ Derek kept clearing his throat with absolutely nothing to say, feeling like an overdressed tool in his dark blue button-up. Paige, in jeans and a purple long-sleeve shirt, was alternately pursing her lips and looking over Derek's shoulder, like there was something more interesting standing behind him. Or like he was maybe just that boring.  
  
"Uh," he said, and drew her bright dark eyes to him expectantly. Derek felt sweat gather in his pits. His shirt collar was abruptly too tight. He was depressingly certain he was about to say something inane about the weather, when he was rescued by an excitedly shouted, "Derek!"  
  
It was Stiles, wearing a red hooded t-shirt and blue jeans, tugging at his mom's hand as he dragged her forward through the diner. It looked like he'd just visited the barber given his newly buzzed hair. Claudia behind him was amused in a geometric print sundress, auburn hair in a pixie cut. She had a configuration of beauty marks on her face which was probably where Stiles inherited his own constellations, and she was faintly smiling. "Didn't mean to interrupt you guys," she said, swinging Stiles' hand gently. "The kiddo's been looking for you all day, and I couldn't stop him from running over." There was a smirk hiding in her smile and a wicked light shining in her eyes, and for all that her words were phrased as an apology, they weren't actually all that great at their job. Stiles made a lot of sense as like, a person, if you knew his mom. Still, it was a lifeline, and Derek grabbed onto it much like any drowning man would.  
  
"Uh hey," he nodded. "Mrs. Stilinski, Stiles." He glanced across the table at Paige, who was smiling in polite interest. "This is my – um, this is Paige."  
  
"It's nice to meet you," Paige said.  
  
Claudia smiled and seemed about to say something when Stiles jolted forward. He reached into his jacket and pulled out a card and slapped it onto the table.  
  
It was red, glittery, and shaped like a heart.  
  
"I made it!" Stiles said proudly. Then he stared expectantly at Derek and added, pointedly, "For you."  
  
Glittery was actually the wrong word. The card _was_ glitter. Red heart-shaped glitter.  
  
"Right," Derek said, blankly, face burning. "Thanks, buddy."  
  
That was apparently the correct answer, because Stiles beamed. "See, look, I used all the glitter, and I practiced my words so I could get the writing right."  
  
The writing was: _Be mine!_ And then smaller, beneath: _Please_. And even smaller, lopsided at the bottom: _From Stiles._  
  
"It sure is full of glitter," Derek agreed, trying not to let on how fiercely embarrassed he was at this current moment in time because he wasn't a huge jackass and didn't want to hurt the little kid's tiny heart. But wow this was, uh, not exactly living up to his cool jock reputation here. "And good job on the spelling." The spelling _was_ perfect, though the writing was obviously from the hand of a child, shaky and weirdly formed.  
  
"Thank you," Stiles said, and nodded, and looked at Derek expectantly. Derek looked back, bewilderedly. There was a long and awkward pause before Stiles began to frown, genuinely upset, which was when Paige interrupted.  
  
"It's so nice of you to make Derek such a great card," she said, smiling at Stiles while simultaneously widening her eyes meaningfully at Derek, as if trying to impart a secret message. "It's really great to get gifts on Valentine's Day from people who care about you. Isn't it, Derek?" And she kicked his ankle sharply. It hurt, and he was a werewolf, which she knew, so she'd probably put a lot of force behind it. He stared at her cluelessly, and he swore he saw her quickly roll her eyes, before saying, "And I'm sure Derek has something for you, too. Don't you, Derek?"  
  
It was obvious when Paige spelled it out, but the only thing Derek had was a jewelry gift box in his pocket with a silver charm bracelet. Well, and a Reese's cup, individually wrapped. Which – could work.  
  
"Yeah, yes, of course." Derek pulled the chocolate out and put it on the table and pushed it toward Stiles. "There you go. Happy Valentine's Day, Stiles."  
  
"My favourite!" The beam was back on Stiles' face and he was indiscriminate in directing it to the whole diner, clasping the chocolate package with his grubby hand.  
  
Claudia reached forward and put her hands on Stiles' shoulders and drew him back. "Okay, bucko, we gave Derek his card and he gave you your chocolate, and your Dad is waiting at home with pizza, so we should let these guys get back to their – " she hesitated, smirked, "friendly dinner. Say bye!"  
  
Stiles pouted, but the promise of pizza and the crinkle of the chocolate wrapper in his hand seemed to convince him, because he was back to sunshine and smiles, saying, "Bye! Bye, happy Valentine's Day, bye!" He waved a tiny fist in the air, enthusiastic, and Derek smiled and waved back. Yeah, Stiles was a cute kid.  
  
Paige's smile was back, the one that was more hinted at than present, quirking up and then pressed back down, though living in her dancing dark eyes. "Everywhere you go," she said, shaking her head.  
  
"What?"  
  
"Always surrounded by admirers," Paige said. She propped her chin on the heel of her hand. Her dark curls tumbled forward. Derek could see her pulse beneath the skin of her wrist, fluttering slightly too-fast, similar to his own.  
  
"The only person I'm looking at is you," he said.  
  
Paige's heartbeat tripped. There, her smile again, rising up, bitten down.  
  
Giddiness welled and pooled in Derek's stomach. Yeah, he was smooth.  
  
"I'm kind of jealous, though," Paige said, and tapped her other hand on the card still on the table, reflecting light. "This is a pretty sweet Valentine's card. Stiles must really like you."  
  
Derek rolled his eyes and sighed. "He's just got a crush, it's kid stuff."  
  
Paige laughed, but clearly disbelieved him. It was hard to reconcile the sweet kid who'd just handed Derek a painstakingly crafted card with the demonic hell monster that was Derek's weekend existence, though, so Derek could hardly blame her.  
  
Their food came soon after that, and then there was the opportunity to present the Valentine's gift, and Paige's genuine delight led to her spontaneously clasping his hand across the table surface, and it was a really truly good night.  
  
It was with an absent mind that Derek stuffed Stiles' card in his pocket before escorting Paige to his dad's Camaro to drive her home, though not without parking for a half hour first. The next day he'd wake up and realize the glitter on the card had gotten onto all his clothes and _everywhere_ , and who knew how many cycles in the wash it would take to get them all out; just when he thought he'd gotten the last of it, new traces popped right back up, gleaming in the corners of his eyes.  
  


* * *

  
  
Stiles spent a lot of weekend time at the Hale house because both his parents worked odd shifts as deputy and park ranger respectively, and Derek had come to expect Stiles' tumultuous addition to the household on a regular basis. But the weekend after Valentine's Day Stiles was subdued. He didn't even fight back when Cora stole his cookies and beat him to the backyard swing set and then refused to share the other swing, stretching her entire body across both seats and shrieking for someone to push her. Stiles just flopped onto the grass lawn by Derek who was stretched out with his English Lit.  
  
"Um," Stiles said, tugging ineffectually at the grass.  
  
"Yeah?" Derek said, not looking up from Lord of the Flies.  
  
"That girl, the one you were with before, is she, um, your girlfriend?"  
  
Derek did look up at that. Stiles was _miserable_. His face was all twisted up and his shoulders were hunched. He was curled in on himself, folded down and compressed. Derek felt a quick jerk of panic twist in his chest. Crap. He knew how much it sucked when someone didn't take your feelings seriously and he didn't want to do that to Stiles, but he didn't really have any other options than to say, "Yeah. She is, kind of. We're getting there."  
  
"Oh," Stiles sniffled. Actual tears were coming out of his actual eyes. "But I made you a card."  
  
"And it's a really great card," Derek said. He inched closer, sitting up, and put his hand on Stiles' little back. The thin bones shifted as Stiles drew in a deep, shuddering breath, trying not to cry. "It's in my room and I swear I'll keep it forever. But just because you make someone something and you like them a lot, that doesn't mean –" _How_ to explain this to a seven year old? "That doesn't mean that they owe it to you to like them back in the exact same way."  
  
Stiles made a tiny hurt noise. Derek felt like the monster those anti-werewolf activists were always calling him and his family.  
  
"I do like you, Stiles, of course I do. You're great. I like you a lot, I promise. Just not that way."  
  
Stiles looked up at him. His eyes were a bleary gold. "But you, you _have_ to," he said. "You're my – there's red thread, tying us together."  
  
_Ugh_. The red thread myth that people always seemed to get stuck on. Well, some people anyway. Not all people, thank god; not Paige. Derek had heard her quiet scoff at classmates' sighing wistfully over soulmates and fate. But Stiles was just a kid, and it wasn't like he knew better, so Derek just kept rubbing his back and said, "Maybe there is, but that still doesn't mean I can like you the way you like me." And Stiles shook, and cried, but eventually accepted, and the world didn't end.  
  


* * *

  
  
When he was sixteen, Derek -  
  
Everyone was an idiot at sixteen, but -  
  
And the thing was, a kid in love is one thing, but a _werewolf kid_ in love -  
  
He...  
  
fixated.  
  
The world narrowed down to a single word, and that word was Paige. She was so much _more_ than he ever thought. When they were together, the way he _felt_ , it was – when he was touching her, how she smelled, the curve of her ear and the curve of her smile, the curve of her cheekbone and the edge of her eye, he -  
  
_wanted_  
  
to be with her. Forever.  
  
And he thought no one, no one ever had, ever _could have,_ felt this way. This vast, overwhelming and terrifying love. Like he was desperate for her and – couldn't let her go. Unless she wanted to go. But she clasped onto him with just as much strength, and, and Derek -  
  
made a very bad mistake.

* * *

  
  
She didn't die.  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> every year as valentine's day approaches i think "maybe this will be the year i finally finish and post the valentine's fic, which has been living rent free in my harddrive and my brain for too long! too long!" anyway i didnt finish it but i am posting it, with caveat of there are only a couple of chapters already written and who knows when it will be done. (it is all outlined/planned, etc.) happy valentine's!!


	2. Chapter 2

“Come here, Mischief,” Claudia said, beckoning with an open hand. Stiles went to her. This was a dream. Stiles knew it because he was smaller now than he was in real life, and also because his real mom was in a magically induced coma and could say nothing. But in his dream, Stiles was small enough to fit under her arm as she pulled him to sit next to her, holding an open book across their laps. They were in their living room, on the floor, by a fort made of blankets and sofa cushions. Claudia stroked Stiles’ hair back from his forehead and kissed his temple. “Do you want a bedtime story?”  
  
“Yes, please,” he said, polite and anxious like he never was awake. Like he had to be on his best behaviour so that she would stay with him, so that her love would be real.  
  
“Once upon a time,” Claudia said softly. “In a land far away. A huntsman lived by a wood. He was very good at killing things, and he ate them and skinned them and wore their fur. He survived this way for such a long time. But you can only survive as a killer when there are things to kill.”  
  
Anxiety rose up in Stiles. It was formless. He couldn’t get a grip on it, couldn’t shove it back down.   
  
“A summer passed with no prey for his arrow, and a fall passed with no prey for his traps. In the winter, there was only snow. He greeted spring so thin that his strength had left him. The weakened huntsman heard it then, the tapping on his door.” Claudia’s voice was so smooth and steady. “Tap, tap, tapping, on his door. Like someone waiting to be let in.”  
  
Her voice tilted higher in pitch. “Let me in, let me in,” Claudia said. “I have food for you to eat. I will grant you succour. You just have to let me in.” Her hand stroked the side of Stiles’ face, the fingertips curling just slightly. Her nails trailing along his skin, gentle, sharp. “The huntsman knew a friend was not at the door. But he was weak and hungry. And the tapping never stopped. Day and night, the knocking on the door.” Her voice. Something wrong with her voice.   
  
_Let me in_. A slowly opening door.  
  


* * *

  
  
Mornings now were different. His dad always looked tired, and Stiles knew it was because he wasn’t sleeping much. It was quieter without his mom around to poke at them, and the food was different because his dad mostly just made eggs and bought different cereal. He didn’t say anything about Stiles drinking milk right out of the carton, which was kind of cool. Stiles’ mom had always cared about that a lot. “Gross, don’t be a caveman,” she’d say. “I’m not going to send you out in the world thinking that’s okay behaviour.” Stiles’ dad just did it too.   
  
Sometimes his dad dropped him off at school, but sometimes he acted like it was okay for Stiles to walk there himself. If Stiles was walking alone, he had to leave earlier, so he could only do it on the days he woke up at seven. If he woke up at 7:30, his dad would just pack him into the squad car without even saying a word, no negotiation. That was another thing that was different. Claudia always negotiated things with Stiles, everything was always a discussion or a deal. But when it was just his dad, it was always the way his dad wanted it done. Not meanly. If Stiles said he wanted something a certain way, his dad would do it, or explain why it wasn’t going to happen. But Stiles had to speak up first. It wasn’t just assumed that they were going to figure stuff out together. It wasn’t like they were a team. It was like Stiles’ dad was the guy in charge and Stiles just did as he said.  
  
School was different, too, because everyone knew his mom had gone crazy and tried to kill him, and that it turned out her brain was rotting, and now she was in a coma until they could fix her. No one really knew what to do with any of that, including the teacher, so Stiles mostly got left alone.   
  
After school, things split a little differently day by day. The days where Laura was available, he’d go over to her house to be babysat. He was nine so in his opinion, he was too old for this by now, but in his dad’s opinion, it was still a necessary requirement that he be closely supervised. Laura was in her second year of community college and her schedule was all over the place, so she wasn’t available the same way she used to be when he was a kid. When she wasn’t available, Stiles either hung out at the station with his dad, or at the long term care home with his mom. His dad didn’t like to do that one because he said it was them treating the nursing staff like free babysitting, but Mrs. McCall said it was okay. She was one of his mom’s nurses. She said she brought her kid to the hospital a lot too, when she was working hospital shifts, and that she thought Stiles was a good kid like her son, and that it wasn’t a problem, and she understood it was tough.   
  
She was nice. There were golden threads wrapped all around her, thin and wispy but full of light. They trailed off together, forming a thick rope, and Stiles thought they must attach to her kid, far away. His mom used to have a golden rope that connected her to Stiles, too. He used to reach for it when he was small, touching it so that he could feel how she loved him.   
  
Around a year ago, it started to go gray. That was when he knew something was wrong. That was when he started following her, so he could gather proof and present it as evidence, because he knew that was the only way his dad would believe him – because no one else could see the strings or thought that they were real, so he needed something else, something solid. He needed to show his mom was in trouble and that they needed to save her.   
  
In the evenings, he’d go home. They didn’t really cook dinner. They usually just microwaved stuff, nothing name brand, all the discount prepped meal type things. It tasted like hot garbage. Stiles said that once. “This is hot garbage.” A month after his mom had been sent to a cursed sleep, when they weren’t letting Stiles see her without supervision. “It’s disgusting,” Stiles said. Defiant, and bratty, and like he wanted to hurt his dad.  
  
They were sitting in the living room, Stiles on the sofa and his dad on the recliner, watching baseball. Stlies’ dad stiffened and got up, and Stiles was afraid. It didn’t make sense to be afraid because his dad never yelled or even threatened at violence, but he was still afraid, like a reflex. His dad did nothing and said nothing, just went into the kitchen and banged around. He came back out fifteen minutes later with soup – reheated out of a can – and sandwiches – cheese and ham, on two trays. He handed Stiles a tray and took his own back to his chair and sat back down, all without saying a word. And he went on like that for the rest of the week, but it never tasted good. It just tasted like cardboard and resentment. So the next night, Stiles dug out a couple of the horrible microwave dinners and prepped them for him and his dad himself, and that was that, they were back on the menu.   
  
After dinner, Stiles did whatever homework got assigned that day and then played video games until it was time to shower and sleep. He’d lie in bed and flex his hand in the dark. He could still see the strings, even when he couldn’t see anything else. The golden cord that tied him to his dad, and the golden cord that frayed in his mom’s direction. The silvers and pinks of friendships. He had a green one for Laura – it felt friendly, and nurturing. He had a red one for Derek, bright, shining. It used to be his favourite one when he was a kid. He had a blue one for Lydia Martin, which he liked to admire. That one felt like amusement and contempt and friendship and competition. They liked to fight over who was the smartest kid in class. Mostly Lydia won.   
  
On the nights that Stiles felt brave, he’d hold on to the one that led to his mom. He’d call out for her, just not with his voice. _Can you hear me?_ he’d send. _I miss you._  
  
And then he’d sleep. And in his dreams, the monster came, wearing his mom’s face.  
  


* * *

  
  
“Mischief, come here,” the monster said. This time they were in the clearing in the Preserve, the one where Claudia had once showed Stiles all of her maps and told him about telluric and ley currents. Stiles went to it, and they sat together on the ground. Like his memory had conjured them, on the floor before them were perfect replicas of Claudia’s prized maps. The monster held Stiles close to its body as they looked at the lines, petting Stiles’ head gently. “Let me tell you a story.”   
  
It was also the clearing where Stiles’ mom almost killed him. Stiles remembered that, too, suddenly and shockingly. It happened at night, when he followed her. He remembered how she had stumbled, off balance, drawn unerringly to this one spot. She’d knelt in the dirt and begun to claw at the earth. Then she began to put the dirt in her mouth, began to eat it.   
  
“Once upon a time,” the monster said. “In a land that was all forest, there lived a man and a woman and a child. Together, they made a family. They lived in small house that had only one door, and they said the door must never be closed to any of the others in their small family. The door must always be open, and if the door was ever closed, it meant they no longer belonged together. Whoever was on one side of the door from the other two would no longer be theirs.”  
  
“I don’t like this story,” Stiles said. His voice was so young. In the dream, he was younger than he was in real life. He was so small, but it didn’t make him feel like he could hide. It just made him weak.   
  
“Not all stories are happy,” the monster agreed. “What do you think is the saddest thing?” the monster asked. “For the woman to be alone, or for the man to be alone, or for the child to be alone? You have to choose. Who is on which side?”  
  
“No one should be alone,” Stiles said. He felt his voice inch into a whine. “This is a bad story.”  
  
“Not all stories are good,” the monster chided. It rocked Stiles closer, comforting him. “You open the door, you close the door. You closed the door that was opened. So now you have to open a door that is closed. That’s what balance is, Stiles. You have to choose.”   
  


* * *

  
  
Paige Katsaros was another patient in the long term care home, but she was recovering – not warehoused.   
  
Stiles overheard that term when he went to his mom’s old office to try to pack up her things, so that they’d be safe for her when she came back. It was one of the jobs his dad gave him to do while his dad was busy with some kind of paperwork. Outside of the office, where Claudia’s coworkers didn’t think Stiles could hear them, they muttered to each other. “Heard she almost got stuck in Eichen, but then they got some financial support from the Foundation and Stilinski got her warehoused in Valhalla instead.” Valhalla was what they called the long term care home. Stiles didn’t understand what they meant by warehoused. When he asked his dad on the drive home, Noah’s hand tightened on the wheel and his lips tensed and went white. “Assholes,” Noah muttered, and wouldn’t answer Stiles’ question. That was how Stiles knew it was pretty bad.   
  
Paige was allowed to have visitors, but she didn’t get that many of them. It was mostly just Derek, slinking in and out guiltily, and her mom, who sat at her bedside and knitted. They lived in California, so Stiles wasn’t sure what she was really knitting for. When no one else was around and when Stiles got tired of staring at his mom’s slack face, he’d go see Paige. She was nice. She couldn’t speak because she had no control over her newly awoken Siren abilities, but she had a dry erase board that she’d write on and they’d play hangman or I spy, not that there was a whole lot to look at in just the one room.   
  
Paige was really pretty – like, _really_ pretty. Stiles hadn’t recognized that about her when he was a kid, but he could tell now that he was almost ten, how pretty she was. No wonder Derek loved her. She was pretty and nice and answered all his questions, which was how he learned what it meant to be warehoused, and why it sucked so bad that they’d talked about his mom like that, like she wasn’t a person, just a thing to be stuck somewhere for everyone to forget.   
  
Paige even answered questions about what had happened to her. No, it wasn’t a wild animal attack, but yes, it was an attack. No, she wasn’t paralyzed, but yes, she had lost some fine motor control. Hopefully it would come back. Yes, she almost died, yes, they’d had to poke through her family tree to see if she had any supernatural ancestry anywhere whatsoever in the hopes that it might save her. Sirens weren’t especially known for their healing capabilities, but they did a better job of it than pure humans. No, it didn’t mean she could now sing people to death. Yes, it did mean she would need to find a Siren colony that could teach her how to handle her new status. Yes, that also meant she was leaving Beacon Hills. No, she didn’t know for how long.   
  
She didn’t just answer questions, though; she also listened. Her dark eyes were patient and intent when Stiles rambled on, even when Stiles rambled for a long time. She was like, really, _really_ nice. She was nicer than Derek, even, who was kind of a jerk now. She patted Stiles’ hand when Stiles told her about his mom. She saved him a peanut butter cup from the candy stash her family regularly brought.  
  
It was nice in Paige’s room, filled with shining thread in shades of silver and gold, the colours of love. Stiles missed her when she finally left. They’d found a colony in Greece that would adopt her in. She kissed Stiles’ cheek goodbye.   
  
Claudia’s room was dark, filled with frayed thread, broken ropes, decay. Stiles walked closer to her, where she was sleeping on the hospital bed. He reached out to touch where the strings began to connect to her – though they were fewer now, and grayed. Something shifted right over the surface of her skin. Too late, Stiles saw it – a net, made of fine dark brown thread, flinging itself across his hand and tangling around his fingers.   
  
He tried to pull away – he yanked himself away. But it held him fast, anchored from her body to his. It felt slimy, wrong. Like mold. It felt dirty and disgusting. It was creeping up, and Stiles had to break free.   
  
“No!” he shouted, and like magic, the brown thread faltered and fell back. It spooled back over the surface of Claudia’s body, going translucent, sinking inside of her.   
  
And Stiles remembered the first time he had seen it. He hadn’t known what it was then, when he was looking at it. At night in the Preserve, in their clearing. A meshing of brown string that tied Claudia to the land, that brought her close to it, that trapped her. She hunched on the ground and ate, ate dirt, ate small pebbles, ate sand. Stiles crept closer. She was moaning, low and animal in her throat, and shivering slightly. She was shuddering. She didn’t look like his mom. She didn’t look like a human, like a person.   
  
Stiles made some kind of sound and she stilled, then swiveled her head slowly, like a predator. Her eyes were tracking for movement and, like a prey animal, Stiles stood stock still. But Claudia still saw him.   
  
She saw him, and she moved.  
  


* * *

  
  
“Oh, Mischief,” it said.   
  
It was a dream. Dream logic and dream knowledge. But still Stiles knew it was true. “You’re inside her, aren’t you? Right now. You’re there.”  
  
“She fought me,” it sighed. Mournful. “She fights me now. She screams.” Like always in the dream, it held Stiles in its arms.   
  
Stiles tried to push away, to wiggle free. But he was so small and its arms were so strong, and it held him safe and secure like a mother holding her child. “Let me go! Let go of me!”   
  
“Once upon a time,” it said, ignoring him. “In a land. There was a boy. He had to make a choice. He could open a door, or he could hold it closed. If he held it closed, he would always be safe. The darkness on the other side of the door would never hurt him, and would never touch the world. But on the other side of the door was the boy’s mother, and if he held the door closed, she would never touch the world, and she would never be safe. She would never come home to him. She would always. Be. Away.”  
  
It stroked his hair. Its fingertips were claws.   
  
It whispered, “I will eat her. She will grant me succour. You don’t know, Stiles, how long I have been hungry. You can’t fathom it. You can leave her to me, and I will consume her, and she will never be yours, and I will leave you alone. Or you can open the door.”  
  
All this time, it had been there, waiting. Each night as Stiles slept, it had been tapping to be let in.  
  
Guiding his hand to the door.  
  


* * *

  
  
No one really knew Stiles enough to say how he’d changed, except maybe his dad; but his dad had enough things to distract him. Stiles had hardly any friends and certainly none close enough to tell. Laura, maybe; she’d known him long enough, but she was distracted with school and the start of a new term.   
  
It liked to stay with him. It liked to look at the world through his eyes. It was fascinated by the strings that attached everyone to everyone, everyone to everything.   
  
“And now me to you,” it would whisper to him, deeply satisfied.   
  
It couldn’t do damage to his mom anymore, but it leaving her didn’t magically heal the damage done. Her brain was still shrivelled, had still rotted, and they were still looking for something that would help her. But her vital signs all looked better and they said that it looked like she was having better rest, that she was getting stronger, and that they could make the first few attempts at true healing soon. It was worth it, Stiles thought, even as his guest slowly ate him.   
  
He wasn’t sure how much time he had. He’d need to gather more information before he could figure that out. He carefully didn’t think about it too much, or too loud – he was never quite sure how much it knew, how deeply it could see into him. What it would do if it thought he was a threat.   
  
Stiles was very carefully not a threat.   
  
It had taken a little over a year for his mom to deteriorate to the point of hospitalization, and Stiles could tell the breakdown process was much slower with him. Probably because the monster didn’t have to fight him – because it had been invited in. There was power in invitation. There were Old Laws at work. He estimated he had at least three years, probably more like four or five. Six, if he was lucky and careful.   
  
He was ten years old. That gave him until he was sixteen.   
  
It would have to be enough.  
  
  
  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> re. the string thing - is stiles psychic? who knows. maybe he's just making it all up. (probably not)
> 
> hopefully this chapter creeped u out bc it was meant to lol


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> explicit underage sex stuff between derek and kate here, fyi

Peter was waiting up in the study off the main entrance when Derek slipped in two hours after curfew. Peter slouched against the doorframe, arms crossed over his chest and expression unamused. It was too bad he slowed his aging so much – what might have been intimidating to Derek when he was twelve was just eyeroll-worthy now. "Your absence was noted tonight," Peter said lowly, attempting censure.  
  
It didn't work. Maybe Derek would feel bad if it were his mom standing there, or even Laura. But Peter had no power over him, and hadn't ever since that night almost a year ago. They both knew it. It drove Peter _crazy_.   
  
"Whatever," Derek said. He didn't bother keeping his voice down. In a house of werewolves, volume didn't matter for raising alarm so much as tone. His was bored. He went to brush past Peter on the way to the staircase, and Peter's hand clamped around his biceps and grew menacing claws. Derek gave his uncle an unimpressed look. _You're just a beta,_ Derek thought at Peter. _Any blood you draw will heal before it's shed._  
  
Peter tried to stare him down and failed. "Tch. Youth." He tried to make his voice mocking, dismissive, but his grip tightened tellingly before falling away, impotent. Derek looked directly into Peter's eyes and smirked. Then he went up to his room, not looking behind him once, and stripped to his underwear before falling on to his bed.  
  
Five whole uninterrupted hours with Kate, capped with pissing off Peter before going to sleep – Derek smiled to himself, humorlessly. What a great day.  
  
(Later he'd remember the way Peter's nostrils had flared a beat too long, and the brief spark of satisfaction in his eyes hidden fast, and Derek would know that was the moment Peter no longer just _suspected_ but _knew_.)  
  


* * *

  
  
There was a postcard from Paige in the mail that morning. Talia wordlessly handed it to Derek over the breakfast table. The picture on it was of some harbour and a beach. The writing on the back was short, cheerful. An exhortation for Derek to check his email. <<I sent you a video! Don't be a loser, listen to my concert.>>  
  
Once, Cora and Laura would have teamed up to try and take the postcard from Derek, laughing in sisterly synchronicity. Now they avoided him, too wary of his repressive moods.  
  
Derek ducked out of breakfast to go put Paige's card safely away with the rest she'd sent the last few months. It had taken them a while to get to the point of semi-casual conversation, and it wasn't helped by the distance. But the only inclusive colony of sirens in the world was in Greece, so Greece was where Paige had to be, at least until she had her newly-woken powers under control. It helped in a lot of ways that she was already a musician, but it hindered, too. A few of her emails were just solid walls of complaining text.  
  
Sometimes Derek had to punch a wall until his hand broke and healed several times over before he could write anything back. Paige still wanted to be friends. What Derek wanted didn't really factor in; not when he was the villain of the piece. Nothing he could do now would make up for it, what he'd done then, how thoroughly and irrevocably he'd damaged Paige's life. How he'd almost killed her. How it was all his fault.   
  
It didn't matter what Derek thought or felt. What Paige wanted, Paige got.  
  


* * *

  
  
Kate was wearing a sheer white blouse over a red bra, and a skirt that she'd rolled up way past mini. She sat on the teacher's desk and Derek stood between her spread legs, leaning into her hand on his crotch. "How are you not dress-coded," Derek muttered between sucking little bites right above her breasts.   
  
Kate laughed breathily in that way she probably thought sounded sexy but mostly sounded fake. "Oh, sweetie, you don't dress-code a _teacher_." Her grip went nasty on his dick, and Derek grunted, twitching. His grip around her waist tightened and rumpled her top, fingertips digging into her hips. He could smell her wetness. If she took him out of his pants and if he nudged her panties to the side he could be in her. The thought made his hips tilt up, his dick lift. She chuckled when she felt it. "God, you bad boy," Kate muttered. "Fuckin' _animal_."   
  
Sudden as a blink Derek shifted into beta form and flashed his eyes at her. Her pulse jumped and her aroused scent deepened and thickened. Derek smirked at her. "Least I'm not a pedophile," he taunted meanly.   
  
"Aw, baby," Kate crooned. She crushed her palm against the fabric right at the head of his dick. "You feeling exploited? Little sweetheart Hale." She put her other hand flat against his ass and pulled him forward, right between her legs, rubbing against him. Getting her musk all over his crotch. Derek growled and surged forward, thrusting his hips bruisingly into hers and dropping his mouth to her tit, sucking harshly through the fabric until her nipple tightened and peaked. He switched to her other, pulling cruelly with his teeth and tongue as she locked her heels around his hips and frotted against his erection.   
  
" _Fuck_ ," Kate breathed. "Fuck, Derek. Oh, yes, fuck. Fuck me. Fuck me, Derek. Fuck me. _Fuck me_." She made stifled shrieking noises against his ear as she orgasmed over his dick. Derek rutted against her, getting off on the way she shook around him, getting off on the salt-sweet stink of her. It took her fingers suddenly pinching the head of his cock for him to get there, though, and it was an ugly one, tensed up and coiled. Derek bit into his own lip to keep from drawing her blood.   
  
They stayed locked close together for a handful of heartbeats, before Kate's legs dropped back down and Derek leaned back.   
  
She was flushed, intensely alive, almost windswept-looking. Derek scowled at her. "Aww," she cooed. "Don't you want to enjoy the afterglow?"  
  
Derek stepped away. Now that the hormones were rushing back down, he was displeased. "I came in my fucking pants."   
  
"Just like the teenager you are, huh." Kate smirked.   
  
Derek rolled his eyes. "Whatever," he said. He checked the clock at the far end of the classroom, over his shoulder. There wasn't enough time to shower in the locker room and change. He'd have to skip some of his first class, maybe the entire thing if he didn't leave _now_.   
  
He didn't bother saying anything to Kate as he left. It was already doubtful he'd be able to dodge early arrivals in the halls. He couldn't exactly waste time.   
  
When he saw her again after lunch for fourth period History, she was wearing a professional-looking black blouse and tailored black pants. The only semi-unprofessional thing in her outfit were the red stilettos. She flicked him a sidelong look, but didn't smirk or otherwise betray the thing they had going. She was beautiful; she was a monster.  
  
That was okay with Derek. He was a monster too.   
  


* * *

  
  
He'd dropped extra-curriculars after Paige, so there was nothing to keep him occupied after school and no one expecting him home for hours. These days, his curfew was more of a suggestion than a rule, too. For all that Peter liked to play hard-ass, Talia was giving Derek a lot more leeway than he deserved. He knew it, but he still took advantage of it.  
  
There was just something _really_ addictive about regular orgasms. After classes, Derek more or less ended up at Kate's apartment and they fucked for a few hours before he headed out. They'd been doing it the last two months. She joked about having him trained, but she did have a pretty tight grip – metaphorical and literal – on his balls. Derek was smart enough to recognize that.   
  
He'd recognized _her_ right away, or rather, what she was. Werewolf fetishist. Not exactly _rare_. When he'd looked up her history and saw how often she moved around, he figured she pulled the same stunt in different towns. Substitute teacher for a high school with a vulnerable teen werewolf she could seduce. Packs were notoriously protective of their young so she would have to get them to fixate fast, so she could maintain control over them and enforce the secrecy. When it looked like discovery was imminent, she wrapped things up and left town.  
  
In a way, Derek was performing a public service by not letting Kate get her hooks in anyone else. There weren't any other werewolves in his high school right now, but Satomi's pack had a few kids around his age at the high school the next town over. Derek wouldn't fixate. He knew better. Kate couldn't really hurt him, not emotionally and not physically either, like how he could tell she sometimes wanted to. The edge of sadism, of raw violence, in how she treated him – he knew she wanted him to hurt. It didn't seem at all in conflict with the way she'd just as tenderly kiss him seconds later. Kate was wired differently. Every time she fucked him she broke the law, and she never seemed to care. She was insane. It was like an optical illusion: once you noticed her insanity, you couldn't un-see it. It flickered, tangible, intangible. Ever-present.  
  
Derek knew she was dangerous, but he also didn't particularly care. It even amused him. Part of him was just expectantly waiting for her to hurt him. Part of him wanted her to.  
  
They went a little long that afternoon, worked up from their morning. Kate had smirked at him and asked if the chafing had been too bad. God, she was a bitch. "Want me to kiss it better?" That part hadn't been too bad. It was past six by the time Derek checked his phone and saw his mom had texted, asking him to pick up mac'n'cheese from the diner for late dinner.   
  
There was still enough time to do it, and Derek felt just guilty enough that he would. Kate sent him off with a lazy smirk from her naked lounge on the bed. Derek had done his best to shower the smell off, but Kate hadn't even cleaned up with a washcloth. She seemed to luxuriate in spreading their combined smell around. She drew her knees to her chest and parted them, teasingly. "You sure you don't want another round?" She stretched, arching her back so her breasts lifted. They were really great. Even at his most cynical Derek could appreciate them. She just shrugged, though, when Derek shook his head and continued to lace up his shoes.   
  
Once she'd decided to ignore him, Kate did so thoroughly. She rolled over onto her stomach and reached for her phone on the side table, kicking her legs up in the air as she propped herself up on her elbows. Her shoulders, her naked back, her ass, her thighs and calves and feet – all gilded, golden, flawless, woman. It was hot and wet inside of her, and she tasted sharp, animal. She was all clenching muscle and smooth sinew. She was awful, obviously, but she seemed to see that Derek was awful too, and so it wasn't like Derek was deceiving her when they were together. She could see in him to where he was hollow, inhuman. They were both in this with eyes wide open.  
  
He didn't say goodbye, or lock the door behind him as he left.  
  


* * *

  
  
The diner was the same as always. Mairead the waitress let Derek know the order would be done in another ten. Derek ordered a coffee for the wait, even though it did nothing for him and he hated the taste. He just cupped it at the counter and let the heat from the mug permeate his palm. It would have been hot enough to almost burn a human.   
  
Movement in the periphery turned Derek's head. A small scowling face popped into view. "Ugh," Stiles Stilinski said. "Why."   
  
Derek rolled his eyes tolerantly. "Why, what."  
  
"Coffee. Ugh. You're so old."  
  
As if cued, Mairead deposited a strawberry milkshake on the counter in front of Stiles. "That's what I'm talking about," Stiles wiggled more comfortably in his seat, gleeful. "Thanks, May."  
  
Mairead clucked absentmindedly but didn't otherwise reply. It was really the only way to keep from engaging. Derek had already fallen into the trap; there was no escape for him.  
  
He evaluated Stiles. Still an annoyingly hyperactive kid with hummingbird attention, just older, with a displeased curl to his lip that was relatively new. Not that Derek spent much time around the rugrat now, since Laura had disbanded her babysitting services. Not that Stiles was really even a rugrat anymore – he was what, nine? Ten? Christ, maybe even eleven.   
  
"What are you doing here without adult supervision?"   
  
Stiles rolled his eyes that time. "Please, as if anyone would let that happen." He was self-aware, and knew his status as perpetual potential walking disaster. He nodded to the kitchen. "May's watching me while I wait for dinner pick-up for me and dad. We're eating at the station." The Sheriff's department was literally just across the street. It was a reasonable responsibility to hand off to a child in the double digits age.   
  
Derek grunted acknowledgement.  
  
Stiles slurped at his milkshake obnoxiously, before loudly swallowing and leaning back with a slight wince. "Brain freeze, ow." He was quiet for a beat, two. Then, "Can I have your coffee?"  
  
"What happened to 'ugh, coffee, ew, old people.'"  
  
Stiles rolled his eyes even harder. "I said that like five years ago, come on, Derek, keep up."   
  
Derek snorted. He nudged the mug over a bare inch. "You can have a sip," he said. He hadn't put in any sugar or creamer; Stiles would be drinking it black.  
  
It was amusing watching the over-cautious way Stiles took the mug in his hands and brought it to his mouth, the way his neck and jaw stiffened upon first taste. How he settled the mug down with alacrity, so fast the coffee sloshed against the sides and spilled slightly. "That's still so gross," Stiles muttered, taking a pull on his milkshake to clear the taste away.  
  
"If you know it's going to be gross, why do you keep drinking it?"  
  
" _You_ don't even drink it, why do you bother ordering it?"   
  
Derek just shrugged. He didn't answer. Stiles would just argue with any that Derek gave.   
  
Stiles huffed. "People are always like, _you'll understand why when you're older_. About coffee, and stuff. So I keep thinking, maybe I'm old enough now." He frowned, glum. "Guess not."  
  
Derek felt a surge of – _something_. Fondness, nostalgia, caring, amusement, sadness. It pierced through the dull fog of apathy and low-grade anger and prodded his empathy. Growing up sucked. It especially sucked when your mom was in a coma and literally everyone in town knew about it. Derek never brought it up around Stiles. He figured he might be the only one who didn’t. "You never know," Derek said. "Maybe you're always going to hate coffee. Some people do."  
  
Stiles considered it, glancing sidelong at Derek. His cheeks were round, but his general frame was bony. Derek couldn't help compare him to the kid he'd once hung out with nearly every weekend, years ago. He felt a pang. "Maybe," Stiles said. He went back to drinking his milkshake, but his head was tilted like he was considering something and he kept glancing at Derek from the corner of his eye, until Derek finally fully turned his head to face him, and rose one eyebrow.   
  
"Either say what you're going to say or go away," Derek said. He gave Stiles more leeway than he should have, relic of residual fondness, but he annoyed easily.   
  
"No, I, just," Stiles stuttered, flushing. "I just wanted to know if you were dating Ms. Moore."  
  
Derek went cold, then hot. Ms. Moore. Kate. "What?"  
  
"Uh...." Stiles fiddled with his straw. "I saw you guys. In her car?"   
  
Fuck. That had been last week.   
  
"I mean... I know you're old, but dude, she's like, really old. And a teacher! She substituted my class a few weeks ago and she made Isaac cry. She's kind of mean." Stiles scowled.   
  
"I like mean," Derek said thoughtlessly, still preoccupied by the fact that his secret wasn't so secret. Except, it had been at least a week that Stiles had known about it, and he hadn't told anyone yet. "Stiles, look, don't –"  
  
"Don't tell anyone. I know," Stiles said. "I'm not stupid. I just wanted – Just. Why her? She's gross and kind of creepy."  
  
Most other people wouldn't say that about Kate, who was beautiful and know how to fake decency and a smile, but it wasn't like Stiles was _wrong_. And Derek didn't have an actual answer for him. _It's complicated_ , except it really wasn't. It came down to sex and a certain brand of cruelty that was really helping Derek out with his self-hate streak. So he went the cop out route. "I know you're going to hate this, but, it's one of those things you'll understand when you're older."  
  
Stiles narrowed his eyes at Derek. "I just _said_ , I'm not _stupid."_  
  
That had always been one of the more irritating things about Stiles. Even as a little kid, he didn't let people bullshit him. Stiles huffed indignantly and took his milkshake with him as he moved back to sit at a booth, back pointedly facing Derek, who stared after him bemused and a bit adrift.   
  
Put in his place by a grade-schooler. Of course.   
  


* * *

  
  
Late that night, something woke him. Derek lay in bed, eyes open, trying to identify it. His mom’s voice. The warning tone.   
  
She was warning someone about something.   
  
It was dark; it was late. The moon was a half disc shining through Derek’s window. It was on the wane.   
  
“Of course I care, but it can’t be my priority right now.” His mom sounded frustrated. “You don’t know the setback of losing our seeker. We’ve had to re-map entire sections of the Preserve and we can’t keep up with the decay. We’re just going to have to trust Derek right now, because I can’t split my attention.”  
  
“This is a mistake, Talia,” Peter said. Of course it was Peter. “It’s folly not to rein his rebellion in.”  
  
“Folly?” His mom scoffed. “Peter, seriously, tone down the drama.” She sighed. “You don’t know what’s happening because I’ve been shielding you all, but it’s not good. It is in fact quite bad.” Her voice dropped low, into the alpha register. “You’ll just have to believe me when I say I can’t afford the energy expenditure right now. It is literally a matter of life or death.” _So fuck off_ , Derek heard in her tone.   
  
Derek frowned. He had no idea what his mom was referencing.  
  
Peter vocalized a wordless frustrated grunt. “You’re not listening to me. You never listen.” His voice dropped into a whining grumble, subvocalizing in that annoying register where he wasn’t quite understandable but just almost enough that it made you lean in to try to hear him better. Derek could hear him thumping away from Derek’s mom. They were probably in the kitchen. Peter had a basement suite and one of the staircases that led down to it was off of the kitchen. Derek heard him thud down there, and then there were rustling noises as if Peter were preparing for sleep.   
  
Derek’s mom stayed where she was. Derek listened for, and heard, the scrape of a chair dragged across tile. It creaked slightly as it took her weight. He could picture his mom now in his mind’s eye, tired, annoyed at having to deal with annoying Uncle Peter, sitting at the kitchen table. Maybe with her elbows on the table surface, cupping her face in her palms, like how Derek had seen her sit countless times before.   
  
She breathed deliberately deeply. Derek counted her breath. Then she exhaled, angrily, almost a snort. “Fucking Peter,” she muttered. She rarely ever swore, and never when she thought one of the kids could hear her. She snorted again. “Fucking Argents.”  
  
Then she got up and went off to her own bed.   
  
Derek laid in his, staring out the window at the shrinking moon. There was an uneasy curl twisting in his stomach. He understood less than half of what he’d overheard, and he’d liked none of it.  
  
He didn’t fall asleep again that night.


End file.
